We Grow Up But Things Don't Change
by LordGrimwing
Summary: Nightbeat needs a partner, and Prowl needs a trainer. Prowl shows up for his first day as a real enforcer and nobodies really happy. Continuation of "I'd Like to Thank the Academy".


"Did you hear about the new officer?" Freeway asked, settling onto a chair next to his fellow enforcer.

Nightbeat looked up from his cube of boiling low-grade. "You're talking about the Praxian the boss grabbed right out of the academy?"

"Wow." Freeway took a swig from his own cube. "You know like everything there is to know about that Prax."

The blue and yellow mech nodded, only half paying attention. Nightbeat was receiving a transmission from the station's commander. Quickly, he stood, cube in one servo, stack of files in the other.

"Sorry 'Way." He said, stepping away. "But Cap. Chase summons."

Freeway wave as the other officer left. "Yah, don't want to keep ol' lead-aft waiting!" He called before heading off to join the other enforcers in the break room.

"Take a seat." Commander Chase gestured toward the hard chair in front of his desk.

Nightbeat did, setting his datapads on the edge of the desk, empty cube safely stashed in subspace. "You weren't very clear about what this meeting is for over the comm sir."

Chase waved the words away, jumping instead to pleasantries. "How have you been? I do hope life is treating you well and all that." Then right on by to business. "I noticed you haven't applied for a new partner."

Used to how the commander ran meeting, Nightbeat nodded. "I'm not working on any strenuous cases. Plus, Searchlight's hoping to get the transfer from down town. I'm fine working on my ow-"

"I'm assigning the rookie to you." Chase pushed a data file to this subordinate.

"What?"

The blue and white mech nodded. "He's talented and's got a lot of promise. Really motivated to prove himself. I'm sure you two will get along just great."

Nightbeat was taken aback. "You want me to train the Prax." He was one of the most skilled mechs on the job, and Chase wanted him to keep some mechling in line. Yeah, that wasn't going to fly.

"Yes. Absolutely. But per his file, the mech's lived his own life here in Iacon, never even been outside city walls." Chase wasn't picking up on the angry buzz of Nightbeat's field. "He'll arrive in an hour, so read over that file."

"Yes, sir." With measured slowness, the enforcer added the pad to his stack and made to stand. "Will that be all?"

"For now." Chase smiled at the annoyed officer.

Nightbeat headed for the door.

"Oh! I'll want a report on how he's doing first thing tomorrow."

"Yes sir." The yellow and blue mech pressed to keypad.

"And do try to keep Freeway from trying to interrogate him. I'd prefer if he learn how to file case report, not harassment charges." It was meant as a joke but there was just enough force behind the words to cause Nightbeat to half sparkedly nod in agreement.

It was a few minutes past the hour, and Nightbeat was just finishing going through his new partner's file. Officer Prowl hand quite the commendable record, even if it was just from being in The Academy. His drill sergeant wrote quite the flattering review of his performance. The seasoned enforcer almost considered himself impressed when he read how well the mech conducted himself when others in the unit singled him out for being Praxian.

Near the end of the file, there was a note that Prowl was raised in a fairly Iaconian family but he'd had considerable contact while growing up with a very Praxian household.

If it wasn't for that part, and his prior knowledge, Nightbeat would have sworn Prowl was pure Iaconian. To be honest, he didn't really have a problem with his partner being from a different city-state, or, rather, having a creator from a different city-state. He just was a little insulted that Commander Chase saw fit to make him train the mech when there were others who not only were good at it but enjoyed teaching rookies.

Noticing the time, Nightbeat stepped away from his desk and headed toward the front of the building to meet the newest enforcer. It was about a quarter past, but rookies were always late.

Except Prowl wasn't.

He'd arrived at Central Iacon Enforcer Complex exactly when the message said to, and waited in the lobby for a whole fifteen minutes. He wasn't alone though. Freeway, out of the goodness of his spark, came to say hi to the black and white mech standing nervously next to the much-larger-than-life city seal.

"So, you're the newbie." Officer Freeway said, settling on a nearby seat.

The younger mech nodded. "I'm Prowl."

The grey mech smiled. "Well, it's nice to meet you Prowl. I'm Freeway. Why don't you take a seat while we wait for your trainer to show up?" He pointed at a nearby chair.

"That's nice of you to offer sir." Prowl returned the smile. "However," here, the sensory wings on his back flared out. "Chair backs are little hard to manage with these."

"That's no problem." Freeway used his ped to twist a chair around so it's back was facing him. "We can just turn the thing around."

Prowl took the seat, resting his elbows on the chair's back. He'd really been worried that the enforcers here wouldn't act all that different from the cadets he'd trained with; his worries seemed to be misplaced.

"Is this your first assignment out of the academy?" Freeway asked, leaning forward.

"Sure is." And it's totally shocked him. Prowl'd been expecting to end up working in a little district that higher ups didn't really care about.

"We're a pretty busy district, so you'll get to see a little of everything before too long." The seasoned officer explained.

Prowl dipped his chevroned helm in agreeance, wings flicking up. "I'm looking forward to it all." Maybe not filing all the reports, but close enough.

"Not often we get someone as eager as you Prowl." Freeway scooted his chair ever-so-slightly closer. "This maybe your first post, but I'm sure you'll see things you're already familiar with." The smile wasn't so friendly anymore.

Prowl leaned back. "I don't know what you're getting at. But I'm sure that-"

Freeway got closer, white denta flashing in the stark light. "Oh, I'm sure you do. Stuff like, oh, tax evasion, grudge killings, bondmate abuse, creation abuse. I'm sure you're familiar with all that stuff, Prax." The insulting term fell from his lips with practiced ease.

Prowl tried not to rise to the bait. The thing with bait is, it's really tempting. "If you actually look at the stats, you'd see that Praxians in Iacon have some of the lowest-"

"I'm talking about your fracking backward city." Freeway was now almost nose-to-nose with Prowl. "Your whole slagging society is fragged screwed up. You Praxes force fems to bond and then beat them. You Praxes make creations just so you can neglect and abuse them. You messed up Praxes fraggin' use pain to reward. That is slagging backwards. And do you know the thing about backward fragging cultures." Freeway stood, grabbed the back of Prowl's chair, and heaved. "They need to fall."

Prowl landed hard on his aft, the edge of his right sensory wing slammed onto the floor, going numb. Anger burned in the young officer's optics as Freeway sneered down at him, dropping the chair on its side.

"What in Nyon's Spire is going on here?!" A voice demanded.

Prowl looked over to the doorway leading into the main building. A blue and yellow officer strode through, a stack of datapad under one arm. He stopped a few paces away, visored gaze locked with Freeway's.

"The newbie here's just being a clutz." The gray officer replied offhandedly.

The new mech snorted. "Don't give me that pile of scrap."

"Actually sir," Prowl rose carefully to his peds. "I wasn't being very careful. I, uh, tripped and knocked over a chair is all."

"Yeah." Freeway agreed. "No need to be so high strung Nightbeat." He laughed, patting the suspicious enforcer on the shoulder before walking off.

Nightbeat sighed, turning his undivided attention on the young black and white mech. "I'll assume you're Prowl and ask to follow me." He turned back the way he came. "I'm Nightbeat, your partner for the foreseeable future." He didn't sound very happy about it. "Try to keep up, and hold all questions 'til end of shift."

Prowl swallowed anxiously before following. Yeah, being an enforcer wasn't going to be all that different from being a cadet, except his associates all had more experience than him.


End file.
